In the 1930s the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad
began experimenting with new car designs
in an effort to save money and keep their
own employees employed. One of the more
successful designs, and one that became
a signature design for the B&O, was the
wagontop design.

In 1935 and 1936, the B&O applied
this design to about 7 cabooses and each
had its unique traits. These first designs
were classified as I-5. In 1941 the B&O
applied an improved wagontop design
to a new, all steel caboose and it became
known as the I-12 wagontop caboose. In
all, the B&O
had 125 of these cabooses constructed in
two separate batches. In 1941 the Keyser,
WV shops built 100 I-12s
and numbered them 2400  2499 and in 1945
the last 25 were built in the same shops
and numbered
2800 – 2824.

Throughout
the life of this fabulous caboose several
changes were made to improve or enhance
its function on the railroad. The caboose,
in 1941, was constructed with a wooden
roof walk, wood sash windows, a slack adjuster,
an early style smoke stack, C style grab
irons on the corners and lanterns. Later
in its service it would see the grab irons
change to a more J shape,
the roof walk change to metal, the disappearance
of the slack adjuster, the wood sash windows
were replaced with sealed windows, the
stove changed to an oil burning stove so
the addition of an oil fill pipe and the
replacement of the smoke stack, the introduction
of a toilet vent, toilet tank, battery
box, the lanterns changed to an electrical peep light
and then later in the Chessie years to
a more square shaped light, the addition
of stimsonite reflectors and lastly vandal
screens. Some cabooses were also fitted
with a red light added just under the end
of the roof running board.

Spring Mills
Depot is proud to be able to offer all
of these variations on its cabooses and
specific to the era and paint scheme as
per the prototype.